


The Protégé

by daisyqiaolianmay (skinman)



Series: The Parts That Make A Whole [6]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst, Family, Gen, Hope, Mother/Daughter relationship, Post 3x07, because everything's so full on right now, bittersweet i'd say, daisy is phil's protege, i need daisy and may talking about a happy future, lowkey philinda, post many heads one tale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-05
Updated: 2015-12-05
Packaged: 2018-05-05 03:49:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5359976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skinman/pseuds/daisyqiaolianmay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the Prompt: 'the conversation that may and daisy had in the last episode that we didn't hear'. Post-Many Heads One Tale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Protégé

Reminiscing was not something Melinda May tended to indulge in. Looking back only led her to all the mistakes she’d made, all the mishandled situations, all the lives taken and lost. May was not a sentimental person. Nostalgia had always been Phil’s area. She wasn’t one to collect trinkets in order to herald days long gone, but even she had her weaknesses.

The perception of the past was fickle, everyone remembered it differently, and more often than not the further one managed to get from an event the more blurred the perception became. Any attempt to relive those moments ended in innocent ignorance, drawing upon bare bones to rebuild a body too beautiful to be have been truly real. People liked to romanticise the past. To her it made more sense to romanticise the future... something she still had the opportunity to shape.

Phil was always a culprit, talking of the ‘elegance’ of those decades. He’d call upon fond memories of their academy days; wide, thin smiles caused over recollections of unprecedented, ruthless water fights out on the training fields in the dead heat of a late 80’s summer, innocently surpassing the knowledge that the next week a fellow cadet had fallen from the same netting she had chased Phil around and broken their neck. Melinda didn’t not look back because she couldn’t remember, it was because she remembered too much. It wasn’t that she couldn’t see the beauty of her past, it’s that she couldn’t seem to separate it from the horrors. Truthfully it was one reason Phil was so important to her, for a moment, when he laughed and told tall tales of what had been, she could forget, just for a while.

Daisy eluded her. Her ability to so quickly come to terms with the knowledge that for her entire life she’d been chasing down a hope only to find cruel and countless horrors. She’d watched her father slip his fingers round her mother’s neck, eliciting a violent click, all after seeing her mother murder another. It seemed like… it had just made her stronger. She’d chosen not to see it as an end, instead she was reborn, a new name… or perhaps an old one… technically, and a renewed drive to be the best she could be. To protect.

May had worried about her. Skye. When she was no more than a delinquent hacker they’d somehow inadvertently adopted off the streets of L.A. May remembered, with vivid clarity, the broken look in the girl’s eyes when May had torn her down that evening on the Bus, those years ago, telling her she needed to discard the search for her parents or leave S.H.I.E.L.D altogether. It wasn’t just because she’d had a bad day, or because Coulson had warned her against allowing Skye to investigate her origins. It was so much more personal than that. Melinda knew that little good came from dredging up the past, especially when someone had tried so hard to bury it. People buried secrets for a reason. Perhaps… she’d even innocently envied the girl a little, her youthful ignorance. It reminded her of who she was, who she could have been. She’d wanted to protect Skye from what the world could do to a person. Melinda would give everything to forget some of the things she knew. At the same time May hated that she’d been right to fear the truth of Daisy’s past.

“Still never gonna get used to the Bus not being here.” A familiar tone offered as the fellow Agent sidled up to her against the wall of the aircraft hangar.

May hummed in agreement.

Daisy sighed, leaning harder against the wall, arms folded, “You want to go a few rounds?”

“Mack not around?” Melinda asked. She knew that in her absence Daisy had taken up using Mack to spar with, given Bobbi’s injuries.

The other agent scrunched up her nose, conveying that she knew something her S.O. didn’t, “Yeah… no.”

May shot her a look, a silent inquiry.

Daisy caught it and shrugged, “I managed to flip him yesterday.”

The older agent looked unconvinced. A hard thump to the back was not quite enough to send Mack running.

“I accidentally dislocated two of his fingers…” Daisy gritted her teeth in an apologetic expression before continuing with emphasis, “But Jemma said he’s fine and I’ve apologised _so_ many times.”

May couldn’t hide her smile. The legitimate regret in Daisy’s eyes was endearing. That nosy, indelicate kid she’d first met was still in there. She’d grown, but she was still there.

“It happens.”

Daisy’s only response was an awkward mix of a nod and a shrug.

“Come on. Your footing needs work.” May said, patting Daisy’s upper arm lightly as she began to move away from the wall.

“My footing?” Daisy rejected the statement with incredulity.

“You know how to flip into a hit yet?” May already knew the answer to her own question.

“…In theory.” Daisy supplied in a wavering tone. She had to admit it would be cool to be able to make her fighting style as fluid and acrobatic as Bobbi and May’s.

“Theory isn’t going to stop you from getting your ass kicked.” May’s tone was almost playful. She turned to walk away so Daisy couldn’t see her face but the girl could swear she was smiling.

“Nope, but these might.” Daisy waved her hands in the air slightly, indicating to her telekinetic abilities.

May turned, still walking, folding her arms, leaning back against the door of the gym to open it. She stood in place holding the door open for Daisy.

“You have to be prepared for any eventuality. Say you somehow end up in a situation where you have to fight with inhibitors locked onto your arms.” May suggested.

“That’s… a fair point. I guess.” Daisy huffed lightly.

“Look.” May stood forward, following Daisy into the centre of the room, onto the mats. The door swung shut behind her. “I’m still your S.O. Which means I’m going to do everything possible to prepare you for whatever you might come up against.”

“And I’m grateful.” Daisy said with clear sincerity. “Sorry… if I seem like I’m complaining. I just, feel like I’m never going to be ready… and now everything is happening at 100 miles per hour and I need to protect people, and I don’t know if I’m going to be able-”

“Right now, the only person you need to worry about protecting is yourself.” May interrupted firmly.

“I don’t think that’s true.” Daisy shook her head, eyes cast downward, shoulders hunched over a little. “The Inhumans, they need protecting, and I feel like I’m the only one that can do that. Isn’t that what S.H.I.E.L.D’s all about; protection. They’re just ordinary people who were thrown into something they don’t understand, but I do. I was the one that pushed the crystals into the ocean.” The girl moved over to the bench, sitting down with a jolt, her intention to spar momentarily forgotten.

May was unsure how to respond to that. Daisy was so vividly reminding her of Phil in this moment. They both cared so much… too much, sometimes. The woman slowly moved to take the space beside Daisy, sitting shoulder to shoulder.

“It’s not your fault. You saved a lot of lives.” May reminded her.

“Maybe… if I’d never gone looking, never found her...” Daisy looked so small, staring at the floor.

“Then they would have found you.” May refused to let Daisy succumb to self-pity, to guilt. She knew how that could destroy a person. “Your mother’s actions are not your fault. Hydra made her the monster she became, not you.”

“I made Cal a monster.” Daisy said it as though it was a fact. She remembered that she was the reason her parents had done such terrible things, what they’d become in their search for her.

“No.” May responded with teeth clenched. Slowly realising that Daisy didn’t have as much of          handle on things as she’d previously thought. “You made him better.”

“I’m so sorry May.” Daisy’s eyes were wet as she bent over, hiding her face in her hands. “Andrew… If I hadn’t… I’m so sorry. I hurt you because of her, and I brought Andrew into it and now…”

May just kept shaking her head, teeth gritted, “No. I brought Andrew in, and he knew the risks. The people he’s killed, they are his responsibility.” May pursed her lips and looked away from Daisy’s hunched form. “But I should have known.”

“It’s all so messed up. A few years ago I was broadcasting Rising Tide manifestos out of a van, dragging an organisation I now work for that doesn’t even technically exist anymore. Can’t help but see the irony.” Daisy said; her more guarded, humorous side kicking in. A defence mechanism. “You’re right though. It could have been worse.”

May’s gaze rose again.

Daisy didn’t look at her as she continued, “My parents could have found me first, instead of S.H.I.E.L.D. I’ve seen what the wrong kind of... influence can do to a person. I was pretty messed up, homeless, alone; I guess I’m just thankful, that Coulson, that you, got to me first. I was so desperate to belong somewhere.” Daisy smiled sadly, “My mom made me like her, she manipulated me, if I hadn’t had a family before her, with you guys, I don’t know if I would have made the same decisions. Maybe, in a different world, I might have been your enemy.”

May’s heart ached more violently than she could ever have imagined. Even after all this time it seemed like a part of Daisy still prevented her from being able to see that innate goodness, that drive to do the right thing, that May so admired.

“I don’t believe that.” May said steadily. “The truth is, you have too much compassion.”

Daisy’s eyes were bloodshot, and wide with expectancy, as she looked up. Pulling her head away from her hands, she waited.

“You always have done. I don’t believe you would ever be capable of what she wanted from you.” May sucked in a deep breathe, pausing, “You know they breed that out of you at the academy, especially if you’re a specialist.”

“Didn’t do a very good job with you.” Daisy scoffed. She didn’t waver, she retorted almost automatically.

May sent her a tiny, fond smile. The younger agent adverted her gaze, almost flustered by how unabashedly direct she’d just been.

“The point is, you’re a good person, and a very good agent.” May said it bluntly, but a smile still played on her lips. “Maybe, one day, you’ll even be our best.”

“You going somewhere?” Daisy half joked. After so many months of absence the idea of May leaving actually twisted her gut in an uncomfortable fashion.

“Someday. I don’t think I’m still going to be able to execute a flip-kick when I’m eighty.”

“Never say never.” Daisy smiled. If there was one person that could, it would be Melinda May.

“You’ll be ok.” May truly did believe that. Daisy had an even stronger survival instinct than she did. “Plus, I think one day you’re going to running this thing, and when that day comes you won’t want Coulson and I under your feet.”

Daisy’s lips parted in shock. She’d actually never thought about it. The fact that one day Coulson would retire, she’d just assumed he’d be a hundred years old and wheelchair-bound still giving orders and cracking terrible jokes.

“I… Why me?” Daisy was legitimately confused. There had to be someone better, more qualified. Maria Hill? Even Bobbi? Black Widow? Someone.

“You have conviction. Faith.” May answered softly, simply. Echoing something Coulson had said to her about Daisy a while back. “In people. Because you're right, S.H.I.E.L.D is about protection, and if you're going to fight for something, you should believe in the cause.”

“A secret organisation… that’s one hell of an heirloom,” Daisy was still struggling to swallow the idea, “Couldn’t he just give me one of his damn collectables.”

 “You’ll be okay, Daisy. And if you ever needed us, all it would take is a phone call.” May made it sound like a promise.

“Because you’re my S.O.?” Daisy could hardly look May in the eyes as she asked.

May didn’t respond verbally, but reached out and gave Daisy’s forearm a quick, assured squeeze.

The younger agent didn’t know what to make of it. “Why are you telling me this?”

“All this; Hydra, the inhuman crisis, it’s just temporary.” May began, “We’re going to beat it. All of it.”

Daisy just sat and listened, accepting. She didn’t know if May was right, but she hoped she was.

“And thinking about the future, makes a hell of a lot more sense than reliving the past.” May stood, holding out her hand for Daisy to grasp.

“Onwards and upwards.” Daisy sighed, smiling as she clambered up.

May twisted Daisy’s arm, putting pressure upwards on the locked limb, she flipped the girl forward. There was the hard smack of flesh hitting plastic. Daisy was left gasping, the air knocked from her lungs, her back pressed into the blue mat where she’d hit it. More in shock than in pain.

An offered hand appeared above her, “Think you could try and flip into that?”

Determination burned in her dark eyes as she quickly accepted the woman’s warm hand. She let her S.O. haul her back up. Daisy had missed this. May was right, spending hours rewriting the past in her head was a waste.

“Take your stance.” May ordered, her tone solid but kind.

Such as waste, when the future held so many possibilities. So many things to learn, to experience… to be.

Daisy reached out and took Melinda’s hand again.

“Ready?”

“Ready.”

 

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__please follow me at[coulsonskids](http://www.coulsonskids.tumblr.com/) on tumblr! i'm taking prompts_ _

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